1 Answer
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The second link in my question ("the link") is a solution. Installation instructions and usage details are included in the synonyms.el file, which is linked on that page.

The synonyms.el file should be placed somewhere in your Emacs path.

A thesaurus file must be downloaded (see the link) and extracted.

Include (require 'synonyms) in ~/.emacs.

Call "synonyms" with M-x synonyms and enter the path to the thesaurus file (this can be configured as explained in the link).

Emacs then reads and builds the synonyms, and prompts for a cache file, which can also be configured as explained in the link.

Enter the word for which synonyms are required; the default entry (activated by just pressing RET) is the word under the cursor.

Emacs looks up the word (this takes a few seconds on my laptop) and presents the synonyms in a *Synonyms* buffer.

I do not know if it is possible to select a word from the buffer to replace the original word.

With respect to the author, whilst this does provided synonym look-up functionality in Emacs, I did not find it to be a convenient or quick solution. It may be easier to simply look up synonyms online when required.